Some Eminent Women of Our Times. Fawcett Millicent Garrett

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СКАЧАТЬ of time to picture to one’s self the passion of loyalty and devotion inspired by the young girl who became Queen of England in 1837. To realise what was felt for her, one must look at the character of the monarchs who had immediately preceded her. The immorality and faithlessness of George IV. are too well known to need emphasis. He was probably one of the most contemptible human beings who ever occupied a throne; he was eaten up by vanity, self-indulgence, and grossness. With no pretence to conjugal fidelity himself, he attempted to visit with the severest punishment the supposed infidelity of the unhappy woman who had been condemned to be his wife. Recklessly extravagant where his own glorification or pleasure was concerned, he could be penurious enough to a former boon companion who had fallen into want. There is hardly a feature in his character, either as a man or a sovereign, that could win genuine esteem or love. Mrs. Somerville was present at the gorgeous scene of his coronation, when something more than a quarter of a million of money was spent in decorations and ceremonial. She describes the tremendous effect produced upon every one by the knocking at the door which announced that Queen Caroline was claiming admittance. She says every heart stood still; it was like the handwriting on the wall at Belshazzar’s feast. Only by contrast with such a man as George IV. could William IV. be regarded with favour. Several prominent offices about the Court were occupied by the Fitz Clarences, his illegitimate children. His manners were described as “bluff” by those who wished to make the best of them; “brutal” would have been a more accurate word. On one occasion a guest at one of his dinner parties asked for water, and the king, with an oath, exclaimed that no water should be drunk at his table. On another occasion, on his birthday, he took the opportunity, in the presence of the young Princess Victoria and her mother, the Duchess of Kent, to make the most unmanly and ungenerous attack upon the latter, who was sitting by his side. Greville speaks of this outburst as an extraordinary and outrageous speech. The Princess burst into tears, and her mother rose and ordered her carriage for her immediate departure.

      It is no wonder that the Duchess of Kent was anxious, as far as possible, to keep her daughter from the influence of such a Court as this. Much of the Queen’s conscientiousness and punctual discharge of the political duties of her station may be attributed to her careful education by her mother and her uncle Leopold, the widower of Princess Charlotte, and afterwards King of the Belgians. It is not possible to tell from the published memorials what clouds overshadowed the Princess Victoria’s childhood. She seems to have had a most loving mother, excellent health and abilities, and a judicious training in every way; yet she says herself, in reference to the choice of the name of Leopold for her youngest son, “It is a name which is the dearest to me after Albert, one which recalls the almost only happy days of my sad childhood.”

      It is evident, therefore, that her young life was not so happy and tranquil as it appeared to be to outsiders. Perhaps her extreme and almost abnormal sense of responsibility was hardly compatible with the joyousness of childhood. There is a story that it was not till the Princess was eleven years old that her future destiny was revealed to her. Her governess then purposely put a genealogical table of the royal family into her history book. The child gazed earnestly at it, and by degrees she comprehended what it meant, namely, that she herself was next in succession to the ancient crown of England; she put her hand into her governess’s and said, “I will be good. I understand now why you wanted me to learn so much, even Latin… I understand all better now.” And she repeated more than once, “I will be good.” The anecdote shows an unusually keen sense of duty and of conscientiousness in so young a child, and there are other anecdotes which show the same characteristic. Who, therefore, can wonder at the unbounded joy which filled all hearts in England when this young girl, pure, sweet, innocent, conscientious, and unselfish, ascended the throne of George IV. and William IV.? Her manners were frank, natural, simple, and dignified. The bright young presence of the girl Queen filled every one, high and low, throughout the nation with enthusiasm.

      The American author, Mr. N. P. Willis, republican as he was, spoke of her in one of his letters as “quite unnecessarily pretty and interesting for the heir of such a crown as that of England.” Daniel O’Connell, then the leader of the movement for the repeal of the union between England and Ireland, was as great an enthusiast for her as any one in the three kingdoms. His stentorian voice led the cheering of the crowd outside of St. James’s Palace who welcomed her at the ceremony of proclamation. He said, when some of the gossips of the day chattered of a scheme to depose “the all but infant Queen” in favour of the hated Duke of Cumberland, “If necessary I can get 500,000 brave Irishmen to defend the life, the honour, and the person of the beloved young lady by whom England’s throne is now filled.”

      The picture of the Queen’s first council by Wilkie was shown in 1887 in the winter exhibition at the Royal Academy. It helps one very much to understand the sort of enthusiasm which she created. The sweet, girlish dignity and quiet simplicity with which she performed all the duties of her station filled every one with admiration. Surrounded by aged politicians, statesmen, and soldiers, she presides over them all with the grace and dignity associated with a complete absence of affectation and self-consciousness. Greville, the Clerk of the Council then, and for many years before and after, writes of this occasion: “Never was anything like the impression she produced, or the chorus of praise and admiration which is raised about her manner and behaviour, and certainly not without justice. It was something very extraordinary and far beyond what was looked for.” Melbourne, her first Prime Minister, loved her as a daughter; the Duke of Wellington had a similar feeling for her, which she returned with unstinted confidence and reliance. The first request made by the girl Queen to her mother, immediately after the proclamation, was that she might be left for two hours quite alone to think over her position and strengthen the resolutions that were to guide her future life. The childish words, “I will be good,” probably gave the forecast of the tone of the young Queen’s reflections. She must have felt the difficulties and peculiar temptations of her position very keenly, for when she was awakened from her sleep on the night of the 20th June 1837, to be told of William the Fourth’s death, and that she was Queen of England, her first words to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who made the announcement, were, “I beg your Grace to pray for me.”

      The Queen was very careful from the beginning of her reign thoroughly to understand all the business of the State, and never to put her signature to any document till she had mastered its contents. Lord Melbourne was heard to declare that this sort of thing was quite new in his experience as Prime Minister, and he said jokingly that he would rather manage ten kings than one Queen. On one occasion he brought a document to her, and urged its importance on the ground of expediency. She looked up quietly, and said, “I have been taught to judge between what is right and what is wrong; but ‘expediency’ is a word I neither wish to hear nor to understand.” Thirty years later one of the best men who ever sat in the House of Commons, John Stuart Mill, said, “There is an important branch of expediency called justice.” But this was probably not the kind of expediency that Lord Melbourne recommended, and the Queen condemned.

      In the Memoirs of Mrs. Jameson, by Mrs. Macpherson, there is a letter, dated December 1838, containing the following illustration of the way in which the Queen regarded the duties of her position. “Spring Rice told a friend of mine that he once carried her (the Queen) some papers to sign, and said something about managing so as to give Her Majesty less trouble. She looked up from her paper and said quietly, ‘Pray never let me hear those words again; never mention the word “trouble.” Only tell me how the thing is to be done, to be done rightly, and I will do it if I can.’” Everything that is known of the Queen at that time shows a similar high conception of duty and right. She was resolved to be no mere pleasure-seeking, self-indulgent monarch, but one who strove earnestly to understand her duties, and was determined to throw her best strength into their fulfilment.

      It is this conscientious fulfilment of her political duties which gives the Queen such a very strong claim upon the gratitude of all her subjects. People do not always understand how hard and constant her work is, nor how deeply she feels her responsibilities. She is sometimes blamed for not leading society as she did in the earlier years of her reign, and it is no doubt true that her good influence in this way is much missed. Mrs. Oliphant has spoken of the way in which in those early years of her married life she СКАЧАТЬ